In This Case Of Self Interest

When Rational Discourse rides atop
a stubborn mule called Belief, fault
lights begin to flicker as neon signs
of inevitability in alarm sequence.

Why, you ask, doesn’t it work? You’ve
slavishly obeyed The Book’s peculiar
dictates, measured exact amounts of
ingredients in order, wet first, dry last.

Left nothing to chance, instructions
read and re-read until they jumbled as
monotonously as recited gibberish in a
brainless liturgy to sure class silliness.

I see God’s hand in this, you say, as if it
excuses fundamentally irreconcilable
differences between mule and rider. He
works, you sigh, in mysterious ways.

Indeed. Were Rational Discourse freed of
1st C bread recipes for baking in an oven
of 21st C design, it might abandon mule
and mine a wealth of open conversation.

Alas, doggerel dogs the heel of all dialogue
intended to free Rational Discourse from a
tyranny of goaded Belief. In this case of
self interest, we call it The Human Race.
© 7 January 2008, I. D. Carswell